


A Gilded Cage

by LGCoffeeAddict



Category: Akatsuki no Yona | Yona of the Dawn
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-10
Updated: 2016-01-26
Packaged: 2018-05-12 22:49:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,548
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5683966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LGCoffeeAddict/pseuds/LGCoffeeAddict
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Son Hak woke up in the middle of the courtyard to realize he'd been drugged and King Il was dead, he all but tore the castle apart looking for Princess Yona. Abducted after witnessing the man she loved murdering her father, Yona found herself in the most luxurious of prisons, but a prison nonetheless.<br/>--<br/>A look at what could have happened if Yona hadn't escaped that night, and how she learned how to fight from within her cage.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The King's Successor

Hak was just barely holding it together.

It took every bit of his formidable strength to keep his hand from shaking as he raised the cup of tea to his mouth. He could only hope the frantic anxiety and panic running rampant in his mind did not show in his face, lest the four other generals at the table notice something. It wouldn’t do to have any questions asked before the Five Tribes meeting began; Hak wouldn’t be able to answer them.

_Three days_ , he counted in his head. _Three days since I saw the Princess._ Underneath the table, his hidden hand formed a fist so tight his knuckles paled. _Three days since I woke up in the middle of an empty courtyard and the world’s biggest hangover_.

Hak set his tea back onto the table just a hair short of slamming it, drawing the attention of the other generals in the room.

“Anything the matter, General Son Hak?” General Geun-Tae, swathed in brown fabric and leopard skins, asked.

Hak did his best approximation of a sheepish smile and waved the Earth Tribe general off. “It slipped out of my hand.” The second the generals nodded and returned to their own musings, Hak let the smile slip off his face. _Not a hangover. A withdrawal from whatever was in the “water” Min-Soo gave me_.

The door to the conference room opened, letting a barrage of sunlight into the windowless space that outlined the silhouette of whomever had called this meeting. _It certainly couldn’t have been King Il,_ Hak thought darkly. He had gone straight to King Il’s quarters upon waking up and finding the Princess not in her bed. The only thing in the King’s room was a horrifyingly ominous streak of blood on the floor. _Three days with that image in my head and no answers. It’s a wonder I haven’t gone mad yet._

When the newcomer stepped far enough into the room to no longer be shadowed by the sun behind him, Hak’s breath left him. _Maybe I have gone mad_.

Soo-Won, who had done a curiously excellent job at evading Hak these past three days, stood calmly at the head of the table, flanked by a strange aristocrat—assistant?—and General Joo-Doh.

“Thank you all for coming on such short notice,” Soo-Won greeted with a somber, if not unwelcoming smile.

“What is the meaning of this?” Fire General Kan Soo-Jin only just refrained from demanding. “Where is King Il?”

Soo-Won ducked his head slightly. “I am very sorry to say that King Il was murdered three nights ago.” Hak, though he had been somewhat prepared for the news, felt as if a giant hand was squeezing his chest as hard as possible. King Il, the kindly man people mistook for a coward, who treated Hak as a son…dead. Murdered.

Soo-Won was speaking again. “We have been unable to find Princess Yona. The matter is undergoing very thorough investigation, but as such, we find ourselves in the position of appointing a new King.”

The aristocrat behind Soo-Won stepped forward, as if every second of this meeting was rehearsed—and it very well may have been. “Since we cannot find Princess Yona, Lord Soo-Won is the only person with royal blood running in him.” Hak’s eyes narrowed. “He was supposed to be the Crown Prince in the first place, so he is a more than suitable…dare I say, the _only_ candidate.”

Perhaps too quickly Soo-Jin announced his support for this new King. A heartbeat later, the Water Tribe General An Joon-Gi nodded his assent, and Geun-Tae gruffly declared his inability to think of any reason Soo-Won should not be King. All eyes shifted to Hak when silence followed the Earth Tribe general’s affirmation.

Hak looked up at the nobleman who bore only the vaguest of resemblance to his childhood best friend. Soo-Won’s eyes were calm, clear, calculating. It didn’t take long for Hak to put the pieces together. Soo-Won _planned_ this. He murdered Yona’s _father_ so that he could be King.

“General Hak? Do you have any objections to Lord Soo-Won becoming King?” Soo-Jin _did_ demand this time. The Fire General was not known for his patience, and apparently Hak had been silent too long.

“I will need some time to think about it,” Hak said, his voice low in an effort to stifle the growing rage in Hak’s chest.

“What is there to think about?” The aristocrat seemed to be bouncing on the balls of his feet in his eagerness to crown Soo-Won. “Lord Soo-Won is the only logical choice.”

Hak couldn’t hide the furious heat in his gaze at the stranger, sending him back onto his heels. “Crowning a King is _not_ a decision to be made in the space between breaths. As one of the Five Generals, it is my duty to give even the most _logical_ choice his due diligence. This country cannot afford a bad leader made so because of our hastiness.”

“General Hak is right, Kye-Sook,” Soo-Won said, before scratching the back of his head and smiling. “I need the approval of all Five Generals to be crowned, so I guess we’ll have to wait until General Hak has had some time to think. We will convene another meeting in two days. Hopefully, that will give you time to decide if I would make a worthy King of Kouka.”

The other generals and the aristocrat had only barely left the room when Hak used his considerable height to loom over his “best friend.” Soo-Won, unsurprised, simply tilted his head to look up into Hak’s almost-black eyes as he growled, “Where—is— _Yona?_ ”

The blond blinked and replied in his normal, soft-spoken tone, making his words all the more menacing. “Nowhere to be found.”

* * *

 

Purple eyes blinked open slowly as sunlight spilled through the open window. For the third day in a row, the cheerfulness of the sunlight and the sounds of birds twittering about in the morning seemed to be mocking her.

Turning around to face away from the window, her half-lidded gaze took in her lush surroundings. _No_ , she corrected herself, _this prison is what is mocking me_. Trays of uneaten food sat by the door, nine to be exact. Rich, spiced meats and buns, wine, tea, and milk all remained untouched. She wished it were out of a noble drive to stand up to her captors, that she intentionally embarked on a hunger strike. She barely had the motivation to sip the cup of water that accompanied each meal, only doing so because she knew they would force it down her throat if she refused.

They couldn’t have her dying on them.

It was only a matter of time before they held her down and mashed food into her mouth, holding her nose until she swallowed.

Unmotivated, she closed her eyes once again and tried to block out the birds.

* * *

 

Hak paced around his room like a caged animal. He was supposed to be using this time to meditate on Soo-Won’s candidacy to be King, but there were more important things. Like _where the hell the Princess was_.

She was alive. She _had_ to be alive. Hak would accept nothing less, and a part of him still loyal to his friend vehemently insisted that Soo-Won would not be able to bring himself to killing her even if he could kill her father. He couldn’t have possibly been pretending to care so deeply for her for the past decade.

But Hak couldn’t decide if he genuinely thought that, or if he was too petrified to think that Soo-Won might have actually killed Yona.

So where _was_ she? Obviously nowhere on the castle grounds. He’d spent the last three days combing through every even remotely possible hiding place and come up with nothing. She couldn’t be anywhere public; his eligibility for the crown depended on the world thinking her dead.

A timid knock sounded at his door. “Son Hak, I came to bring you tea.”

Right before he was going to dismiss the server, he registered the voice. In two long strides, he was across the room yanking the screen door open, revealing a trembling Min-Soo. “In. Now.”

Min-Soo hurried in and set down the tray as quickly as possible—a wise move, since as soon as Hak closed the door, the servant was slammed up against the wall by a fistful of his shirt, a very panicked, very _angry_ Thunder Beast bearing down on him.

“You have a _lot_ of nerve coming here after you _drugged me the night the Princess went missing and the King was murdered_ ,” he hissed, taking grim satisfaction from the look of absolute terror on Min-Soo’s face. It was a miracle he’d restrained himself from pounding the boy into the floor for what he’d done—but he needed answers first.

“General Hak-sama,” Min-Soo pleaded, his hands grasping at the fist in his shirt, “I swear to you, on my parents’ graves, I did not know that water was drugged! I never, _never_ would have given it to you had I known.”

Hak lifted Min-Soo even farther so that his feet dangled. “You haven’t been seen or heard from since you gave me that drink, _so why the hell should I believe you_?”

“The Princess is alive!” Min-Soo blurted. Hak almost dropped him in his relief, but then a whole different kind of fear set in. _Alive, but in what state?_

“How do you know?”

Min-Soo now babbled so quickly it took effort to catch every word. “After I saw you passed out, I went to go check on the Princess, and I saw a bunch of men carrying her to the stables. She was tied up and gagged—and doing her best to kick her kidnapper in the balls, so she was definitely okay. No one notices servants, so they didn’t see me when I followed them out. They’ve taken her to Lord Soo-Won’s estate, General Hak-sama.”

* * *

 

Soo-Won watched the sunrise over the mountains, savoring the peace this time of morning offered him with his morning cup of tea. He tried not to dwell as much on the fact that the colors of the sunrise perfectly matched the hair of a girl he thought he would one day marry.

The girl who saw him pull a sword out of her father.

“Forgive the intrusion, Lord Soo-Won,” Kye-Sook announced his presence, pulling the future King’s eyes away from the mountains, “but Son Hak has sent you a message and insisted you receive it the moment you woke.”

Soo-Won felt his eyebrows climb his forehead. Sending a message was oddly calm for Hak, whom he suspected harbored an urgent desire to kill him. He held out his hand. “Thank you, Kye-Sook.”

He waited until his prospective chief of staff left his quarters before breaking the seal on the small scroll.

_Soo-Won,_

_I know where you are holding the Princess, and I am heading there now. If you haven’t realized already, I will not be in attendance for tomorrow’s Five Tribes meeting—and you still need my approval to complete your ascension._

_You will_ not _get my approval if there has been a single hair on the Princess’s head that has been harmed. And you will_ not _get my approval if your mercenaries try to impede my access to her. I will not try to remove her from the premises for her own safety—that is, unless you have hurt her or have tried to keep me from seeing her._

_Only once you have informed your guards that I am to be allowed to come and go as I please and I see that she is unharmed will I send a message giving my approval._

_If you try_ anything _with the Princess or with the Wind Tribe to pressure me into approval, I will announce to everyone that you have been hiding the Princess—the_ true _heir no matter how much you may dislike it—in your estate so that you could usurp the throne after murdering the King. And you will be executed for treason._

_Do_ not _take me lightly. I would assume you would know how serious I am being—but I don’t know you who you are. You might be stupid enough to think I am not completely ready to cause a war of succession if you try to manipulate the situation any more than you already have._

_I will likely be half a day away from your estate by the time you get this, so I would send that hawk to your guards as soon as possible, otherwise you may not get your approval in time for the meeting tomorrow. What a shame that would be._

_\--General Son Hak._

Soo-Won glared at the scroll in his hand. How did Hak find Yona? The men who escorted her to his estate were all his most loyal—they wouldn’t have talked to anyone, not even Hak at his most intimidating.

_Maybe my estate was too obvious a choice,_ Soo-Won thought. _Hak knew of my fondness for hiding in plain sight. He would have had no trouble guessing._ _But how did he confirm it before leaving?_

Standing, Soo-Won strode across his room and tossed the note into the fire. Best not to gamble with the Thunder Beast; even Soo-Won only knew so much of how he could react. He had sacrificed too much to fail now because he underestimated his childhood friend.

Quietly, in the morning sunlight, Soo-Won sat at his desk and started writing.


	2. Day 4

Hak led his horse up the path to Soo-Won’s estate, a beautiful private mansion in the Eastern woods with a sturdy wall to discourage curious eyes. He’d only ever come here once, when he was 13—although that time didn’t involve dozens of guards staring at him solemnly as he approached the gate.

“I am General Son Hak.” Hak infused his voice with as much formality and power as he could. Knowing how these guards acting in the face of his reputation as the Thunder Beast would be valuable information later. “I trust you have received a message from your lord regarding my arrival.”

The captain of the guard stepped forward and gave a curt bow. “Yes, General. We have been instructed not to interfere with your comings and goings as long as the Princess stays within the wall at all times,” he said, clearly trying to hide the confusion swimming in his eyes. It was not his job to question his superior’s orders, but Hak could see how much he wanted to.

Hak nodded. “Then lead the way, Captain.”

* * *

Yona struggled to sit up in her bed when she heard footsteps. Three days of not eating and only minimal sips of water had left her weak, and for the first time she noticed. She glanced out the window; it wasn’t yet time for her lunch meal to be brought to her. And she wasn’t sure, but it sounded like two pairs of footsteps, one set far heavier than the other.

Her hands formed small fists in the blanket on her lap as her door began to slide open, and she felt her jaw drop at the sight that greeted her.

“H…Hak?” Her voice was feeble from disuse.

Hak seemed to fill up the entire room, his large frame tense as he drank in the sight of her. With the lightning-like movements that earned him his title, his hand shot out and grabbed the guard who accompanied him. “Have you been starving her?” he demanded, ripping his gaze away from the significantly smaller Princess in favor of putting the fear of God into this man’s eyes.

The captain, to his credit, was only mildly alarmed to be accosted so suddenly and answered calmly, “If you look behind you, you’ll see we have been doing our best to feed the Princess. She simply won’t eat.”

“Actually,” Yona’s voice broke in softly, along with a faint grumble that sent blood rushing to her pale cheeks. Hak’s head whipped around to look at her again. “I’m a little hungry now, if you wouldn’t mind sending for my lunch early.”

Politely disentangling himself from Hak’s hand, he bowed. “Right away, Princess.”

Hak waited until the door slid closed to rush to her bedside, kneeling in front of her. “Princess, I failed to protect you, and I failed to protect your father, and that is unforgivable. I am…” He drew in a large, shaky breath as he continued to address the floor. “I am so, so sorry, Princess.”

He wished he could say more than that. He wished he could tell her how much he hurt at thinking she would never see her father’s kind and indulgent smile again. But that wasn’t his place, and it wasn’t what she needed from him. She needed his protection; he just hoped she would still take it even though he failed her so grievously.

A soft hand brushed across his cheek, and he lifted his face to see Yona’s violet eyes glistening with unshed tears. “Hak,” she whispered, “you haven’t failed me. You’ve found me here so quickly.”

“Min-Soo followed your kidnappers and told me where they’d taken you.” Her hand was still on his cheek, and Hak felt a familiar twinge of guilt for wishing she’d never move it. Any time she touched him, that desire would rise to the surface, but now was certainly not the time to let her know that. Or any time, for that matter. She was a princess; he was her bodyguard. He let his eyes narrow as he examined her face for any signs of injury. “Have they hurt you in any way?”

Long red hair swayed as she shook her head, dropping her hand back to her lap. “They’ve left me alone, for the most part,” she said. “Although they probably would have tried to make me eat if I didn’t feel hungry soon.” The thought of food got her stomach rumbling, sending a pink flush to her cheeks.

A big, warm hand laced its way into her hair, the palm nudging her face to look him in the eye. “Promise me, you won’t starve yourself like this again. You will survive this only if you choose to, and I am _begging_ you, Princess. Please choose to survive.”

Yona looked into her bodyguard’s face, seeing a man who had aged ten years in a matter of days. Worry tensed the skin around his eyes, and she couldn’t understand it. He was completely focused on her when he, too, had lost one of his closest friends by this betrayal. “Okay, Hak. I promise.”

A knock echoed through the quiet room, giving Hak just enough time to drop his hand and move a respectable distance away from the Princess before the door slid open to reveal the captain bearing a tray laden with all types of food.

“Thank you, Captain…?”

Once he deposited the tray on the bed next to Yona, the captain gave a small bow, his stiffness belying the awkwardness he felt at bowing to his own prisoner. “Jin, Princess.”

Nodding, she sent a small smile his way. “Thank you, Captain Jin.”

As the Yona started to nibble on a crusty roll, Hak just stared at her. This girl was a prisoner, and yet she showed no resentment to her guards. In fact, for a second, when she thanked Jin by name, she looked more like a queen thanking her royal general.

He only came to in time to remember the promise he’d begrudgingly made Soo-Won. Excusing himself, he ran down the hallway to catch up with Captain Jin. “Captain! I have something you’ll need to send to Lord Soo-Won as soon as possible,” Hak whispered, not wanting to upset Yona were she to overhear.

“Ah, yes, Lord Soo-Won did mention something to that effect when he wrote to tell us you were coming,” Jin murmured back, accepting the scroll Hak produced from his robes. “I will send this right away.” He hesitated before continuing. “Our treatment of the Princess will not change now that this letter is in our hands.” And then he was off, leaving the now former general of the Wind Tribe in his wake.

He’d already sent a letter home to notify Mundok and Tae-Woo of the truth behind the events in the capital, as well as let Tae-Woo know it was his turn to protect the tribe. The second that letter reached Hiryuu Castle, Soo-Won would be coronated, his acceptance the last act Son Hak made as the Wind Tribe general.

* * *

Ik-Soo woke up to a quiet room, an odd occurrence since Yoon almost always woke up before him. Sitting up, the priest saw the sun was barely rising over the high mountaintops; the light didn’t yet reach the quietly breathing mound that was his friend.

With rare grace, Ik-Soo climbed out of his pallet and padded over to the young boy, gently shaking him out of his slumber.

Groaning, Yoon rolled over onto his back and rubbed his eyes. “What is it? Did you hurt yourself again?”

Ik-Soo’s response was uncharacteristically serious. “We have to go on a journey.”

Yoon blinked in the semi-darkness, unaccustomed to this somber demeanor in the priest, and decided to listen to him. Ik-Soo was helpless and never took things very seriously most of the time, but he also had a rare connection with God that had proven much too real over the years. “Where?”

“A village in the northern mountains, to start.” Ik-Soo turned around and started to pack his scant belongings in a bag. “We’ll have a better idea of where to go afterwards once we find him.”

“Him?”

Instead of answering, Ik-Soo yelped in pain, his grace having run its course as he slipped while trying to stand. Laughing sheepishly, he glanced at Yoon through his bangs. “Ah I seem to have landed on my wrist a little oddly.”

Yoon climbed out of his pallet with a sigh and walked over to the ever-injured priest. When he got close enough to see the wrist—which was already turning purple and had a distinct bulge coming out on the side of his thumb—he felt his eyes widen as he all but yelled, “A _little oddly_? How did you even _do_ this? It wasn’t even that hard of a fall!”

This man really was completely helpless.

* * *

Hak sat leaning against the wall opposite Yona’s bed and watched her slowly make her way through the food on the tray. She had been nibbling for an hour and had barely made a dent in it. Meanwhile, he could practically feel his hunger gnawing through his stomach.

“Hak? Would you like some?” Yona offered in her too-soft voice, one still quite feeble from disuse. Looking at her substantially lighter form broke his heart. She was acting like this was a normal day, like when they were kids and would eat effectively all their meals together. Her heart must have been in agony, and she should have been overflowing with vengeful anger. But with every passing minute, she looked less and less like a prisoner and more like…he couldn’t quite tell yet. There was something simmering behind her eyes, something he’d never seen in her before. Something he didn’t recognize. “Hak?”

Her voice broke through his stupor. “You should eat, Princess. You haven’t eaten in days.”

“That’s my point. I can’t finish it. If I eat more I think I’ll lose everything I’ve managed to get into my stomach,” she said quietly. “You should eat, too.”

Acquiescing, Hak stood and made his way to the bed, sitting on the floor beside it and grabbing an apple. He was mid-bite when he heard her voice again, “I want you to teach me how to fight.”

He supposed it wasn’t an unreasonable request that wouldn’t have shocked him were it to come from anyone else. As it was, Hak only just managed to swallow the bite of the apple he’d taken. He turned his head toward her and saw only that simmering behind her eyes, still clueless as to what that meant. “You what?”

Yona looked down at her lap before catching herself and returning her gaze to her friend. Over the past hour of sitting in silence eating, all she could think about was how helpless she felt. How she couldn’t protect herself in her own home. How she couldn’t prevent herself from being kidnapped…or her father from being murdered. Her father looked down on violence and so did she, to a point. She was beginning to realize that her world was rare in its peacefulness—and false.

Mindless violence she would never understand. But protecting oneself and one’s family…Yona didn’t know if she would count that as violence anymore. Not after her last night in her home.

“I want you to teach me how to fight,” she repeated.

Even hearing it again did nothing to help Hak make sense of her request. “But your father—”

“Might still be alive today if he knew how to defend himself,” Yona cut in firmly, her hands tightening in her skirts. “I lost my father and my home in one night, and I couldn’t do anything about it. I never want to feel that helpless again, Hak.”

Hak shook his head with conviction, completely at odds with anything that would put her in danger. “I’m here now, and I’ll protect you. That’s what your father entrusted to me, and I won’t fail again, I promise you.” _Your father knew how to protect himself, Yona. He chose not to. He was no coward. Please tell me you understand that._

“You didn’t fail me, Hak. I already told you that,” Yona chided. “But I don’t want to be such an easy target anymore. I put _you_ in more danger simply by still being alive, and I cannot let you die protecting me. I…I can’t lose anyone else.”

“I won’t die,” he affirmed. “I will always be here, Princess. You won’t lose me.”

“Hak…” Yona climbed down from her bed and joined him on the floor, leaning her shoulder against his while she stared at her knees. “I keep remembering that night as if it was happening all over again,” she whispered. “I haven’t left this bed since I got here except to go to the bathroom because being unconscious was better than knowing I was awake and experiencing it again. I pretended they were just nightmares, but…Hak, I’m _terrified_. I don’t know how to make it stop, and I can already feel myself losing my mind.” Looking beside her at an openly concerned Hak, she heard herself begin begging. “Please. I need to do this. I need to learn how to fight. I need to never feel that powerless again. I need the nightmares to stop happening.”

Yona’s purple eyes glistened with unshed tears, and Hak wondered if she had let herself cry yet. But he felt his resolve weakening in the wake of those tears; so much of her life was now completely out of her control that he couldn’t find it in himself to further confine her, even if it did feel like he was betraying her father.

“Okay.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know it's a bit slow, but I promise it'll pick up soon. The set-up always feels like it takes the longest, but I hope you still enjoyed it and continue reading!


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